I grow Ozark Beauties too. They are everbearing unless I am very much misremembering. :) I agree that pinching blossoms will cause the plants to grow bigger while reducing strawberry numbers. But bigger plants can grow more strawberries later. So I think it's really a question of what you want--fewer strawberries now or more later. Pots are fine for strawberries too. No special pots are needed. Basically any pot is just a container full of dirt. That's true regardless of whether they call it a special strawberry pot or not. My plants are all in a raised bed outside, but I will be putting some of the runners (yes, plural) from my plant into a big bowl this year. Runners are a fact of life with strawberries too. Ozark Beauties produce runners prolifically. I think last year I got a big harvest, followed by runners, and even some runners from the runners, followed by more fruit that the raccoons ate. There's nothing wrong with runners; they are perfectly natural. They are just baby plants that grow from the mother connected by an umbilical. I like them because I end up propagating the plants a lot. See above about my plans for a big bowl. I also end up giving away strawberry plants. Taking runners is a lot easier than growing from seed. But if you don't want more plants, just clip the runners off. That will make the plant focus on itself--resulting in a bigger plant and bigger berries.

If you want a large tree, Black Mission and Panache would be good candidates, as they a5re vigorous gropwers and good tasting as well. I will have about 100 varieties at the Festival of Fruit in August, in San Diego. Email me through the forum and we can work out what would be good.

RHIZO 1 Reasoning, there is the 'posse' which only seems to be a pest aphid, and not the beneficial insects. I didn't state that the person should release preditary insects BEFORE spraying an insecticide, but instead, place preditary insects out a week or more AFTER the spray. Aphids do respond well to pyrethrins, which is quite safe for edible plants, as is neem. The wasps mentioned are usually sent out on a postage stamp sized piece of stiff cardboard that looks like it has gray sand paper on one side. That's the wasp eggs. I have not had much luck with them, or green lacewings either. I do have early pollinators, orchard mason bees (only for very early apple blossoms), and when the cukes start showing up, a whole honey bee hive colony seems to flock to the cuke flowers every year. Had another preditor, the infamous praying mantis. They would sit at the tops of the basil plants where the flowers would emerge and wait for a honey bee to come by. A second later that pantis has his fast meal, and waits for more. I take the mantis off the basil, and the next day its back to its favorte basil spot chomping on another bee. Nope, mo mantis here anymore, even if they eat a lot! Simply hosing down the plants will remove all the aphids but just allow the aphids more clean places to chew more. Your logic is flawed, and organic gardening is something not everyone knows a lot about, unless they have been able to control an insect pests, diseases, and unknown causes to losing plants. Years ago, I tried putting out japanese beetle traps and barely would have a year go bay that the foliage on everything looked like swiss cheese. My poor raspberry leaves were nearly all chewed off as were the horsradish leaves. I tried natural sprays too, with no luck. After a 10 year battle that I was simply losing, I put down milky spore around the outer perimeters of my garden, watered in beneficial nematodes for both grubs and fungus gnats (cost me a FORTUNE!), and tried neraly every kind of pest deterrent there is, including some battery operated LEDs that light up at night and are supposed to attact moths that lay looper eggs. They caught one single beetle on a whole summer, out goes that trap! I also had a lot of striped cucumber beetles and there, I use scent lures and sticky traps nearby the cuke vines. The traps get loaded within a month and always need replecement. Same with coddling moths on my apples, and there I use scent lures and red spheres. I spend more on control of insects and disease than I do on what my produce iw worth, and I would NEVER use garden hose and spray water on my herbs, tomatoes, peppers, cukes, or any other plants. The plant only see rain water on their foliage and my soaker hoses at ground level. I even have a fig tree that does well in its 85lb pot, but is just too heavy to deal with, so in the ground it goes this fall, once the leaves drop off. You seem fixated on the words 'broad spectrum', when in fact an insect pest isn't a single entity, but is part of a BROAD SPECTRUM of insects and many are TRUE pests! A pollinator doesn't have to be a honey bee, there are a many other tiny wasps and bees that love tiny flowers like the ones on dill plants. If I were to spray my fruit trees with something like Imidan, that would kill all bees and most any other beneficials, whereas the beneficials are barely harmed, if at all by diatomatious earth and a pyrethrin. ollinators dont chew on leaves that have insect sprays applied to them.

Thanks Jim!!!! I'm still really excited about it working!!! I have some news about my eyes. I went to the retinal specialist. They put 3 different types of drops in my eyes. I had to pry my eyes open so they could keep going with the drops. Blech. So he said that I have retinal deterioration. Do I have RP (retinitis pigmentosa - where you get tunnel vision and go blind). He said maybe. I asked if there's a chance I could go blind. He said that it isn't a matter of when, but that I'm probably legally blind ALREADY!!! So he's sending me (in a few months probably) for this procedure that's like an EKG for the eyes. If it shows that I'm legally blind, then I won't be able to drive anymore. This would be terrible, because I have trouble walking around where I live because of all of the inclines/declines - it's hard on my ankles, and I just got over having ankle tendinitis (a whole year of it). I love driving to the off-leash areas to take my dogs for a walk. It's so much fun. Anyways, the good news is that he said my vision will get gradually worse - but very slowly. So if I'm not legally blind yet, then I can probably drive for a few more years. Now, I'm asking for prayers that: a) I'm not legally blind b) that I can handle being legally blind if I am. Thanks everyone!! Carol